Most of Canada to receive emergency alert test today
The federal government will test its capacity to issue emergency alerts today, with the exception of Ontario, where the test will take place on May 15.
A scene from 'Causeway' starring Jennifer Lawrence (Courtesy of TIFF)
In the low-key drama “Causeway,” Jennifer Lawrence once again shows why she is one of her generation’s best actors. She delivers a performance driven by subtlety, without a hint of affectation.
As the survivor of an IED blast while serving in the U.S. Army Corps of Engineers, her road to recovery is paved with difficulty. Now, living in her New Orleans childhood home with her negligent mother, she longs to get back to the army to escape the memories of the trauma of growing up as a bright young woman in a home marred by substance abuse.
The person who grounds her, an auto mechanic names James (the brilliant Brian Tyree Henry), has his own crosses to bear.
“Causeway” is a movie about the healing power of friendship and choosing -- as Armistead Maupin said -- your logical, not biological family.
Director Lila Neugebauer, working on a heartfelt script by Luke Goebel, Ottessa Moshfegh and Elizabeth Sanders, has crafted a movie that defies the usual “coming home” drama in favour of a quiet, slice-of-life story that is actually a character study of broken people who find comfort in the company of one another.
Tanya Tucker (left) with Brandi Carlile (Courtesy of TIFF)
“The Return of Tanya Tucker: Featuring Brandi Carlile” is not a regular musical bio-doc.
We get bits and pieces from Tucker’s legendary career, how she had her first hit with “Delta Dawn” when she was just 13-years-old, and her cocaine fuelled relationship with country superstar Glen Campbell, but the focus here is the making of the 2019 album “While I’m Livin.'”
Produced by Shooter Jennings and country singer Brandi Carlile, it was Tucker’s first album in 17 years and earned a Grammy, her first ever.
Director Kathlyn Horan takes a fly-on-the-wall approach that lends itself to revealing many organic and intimate moments of Tucker and her producers, capturing the magic that is Tucker in full flight.
It is a portrait of a legend who calls herself “just a country singer,” but with a voice that is imbued with the texture of a woman who has lived a life, and brings that experience to her art.
At the heart, this is a love letter to Tucker, whose career has had as many ups as it has downs. Come for the story, stay for the incredible music.
Kate Beckinsale and Brian Cox (Courtesy of TIFF)
Kate Beckinsale stars with Brian Cox in Catherine Hardwicke’s “Prisoner’s Daughter,” a movie that blends redemption tale with family drama.
Beckinsale is Maxine, a struggling former Las Vegas showgirl and mother to Ezra (Christopher Convery), a 17-year-old with epilepsy. Her father Max (Cox) is a former boxer and bruiser who, when he wasn’t beating people up in the ring, was an enforcer for the mob.
Estranged for 12 years, Maxine and Max are thrust back into one another’s lives, when Max, diagnosed with pancreatic cancer, is given a compassionate leave from prison, as long as he moves in with his daughter.
“Prisoner’s Daughter” has many predictable elements as the ex-con father and his extended family find a new way to be a family, but Hardwicke’s delicate world building, as she presents the stark realities of Maxine’s life, and her efforts to atone for the mistakes of her past and point Ezra on the right track, bring great humanity to the tale.
Cox brings his trademarked fierceness to Max, but he is a lion in winter, and his softer gentler side is more exposed now than ever.
It’s a movie that wonders if there are best before dates on amends, or if blood is truly thicker than water. Not a gamechanger story wise, but strong performances and interesting filmmaking earn it a recommend.
The federal government will test its capacity to issue emergency alerts today, with the exception of Ontario, where the test will take place on May 15.
Prince Harry, the Duke of Sussex, has made headlines with his recent arrival in the U.K., this time to celebrate all things Invictus. But upon the prince landing in the U.K., we have already had confirmation that King Charles III won't have time to see his youngest son during his brief visit.
An Ontario man found out that a line of credit he thought was insured actually isn't after his wife of 50 years died.
After more than a century, Boy Scouts of America is rebranding as Scouting America, another major shakeup for an organization that once proudly resisted change.
A first-of-its-kind Canadian research study is working towards a major medical breakthrough for a brain disorder, believed to be caused by repeated head injuries, that can only be detected after death.
In March, Indonesian officials and local fishermen rescued 75 people from the overturned hull of a boat off the coast of Indonesia. Until now, little was known about why the boat capsized.
With Donald Trump sitting just feet away, Stormy Daniels testified Tuesday at the former president's hush money trial about a sexual encounter the porn actor says they had in 2006 that resulted in her being paid to keep silent during the presidential race 10 years later.
An Ontario woman said it would have been impossible to buy a house without her mother – an anecdote that animates the fact that over 17 per cent of Canadian homeowners born in the ‘90s own their property with their parents, according to a new report.
Canadian immigrants threatened by hostile regimes are urging parliamentarians to quickly pass the 'Countering Foreign Interference Act' so they can feel safe living in their adopted home.
A chicken farmer near Mattawa made an 'eggstraordinary' find Friday morning when she discovered one of her hens laid an egg close to three times the size of an average large chicken egg.
A P.E.I. lighthouse and a New Brunswick river are being honoured in a Canada Post series.
An Ontario man says he paid more than $7,700 for a luxury villa he found on a popular travel website -- but the listing was fake.
Whether passionate about Poirot or hungry for Holmes, Winnipeg mystery obsessives have had a local haunt for over 30 years in which to search out their latest page-turners.
Eighty-two-year-old Susan Neufeldt and 90-year-old Ulrich Richter are no spring chickens, but their love blossomed over the weekend with their wedding at Pine View Manor just outside of Rosthern.
Alberta Ballet's double-bill production of 'Der Wolf' and 'The Rite of Spring' marks not only its final show of the season, but the last production for twin sisters Alexandra and Jennifer Gibson.
A mother goose and her goslings caused a bit of a traffic jam on a busy stretch of the Trans-Canada Highway near Vancouver Saturday.
A British Columbia mayor has been censured by city council – stripping him of his travel and lobbying budgets and removing him from city committees – for allegedly distributing a book that questions the history of Indigenous residential schools in Canada.
Three men in Quebec from the same family have fathered more than 600 children.